


So Much Trouble

by sheafrotherdon



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Episode Related, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-07-11
Updated: 2008-07-11
Packaged: 2017-10-11 22:48:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/117995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sheafrotherdon/pseuds/sheafrotherdon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Keller tries to do what only John's team can.</p>
            </blockquote>





	So Much Trouble

Keller's never had a patient quite like John Sheppard. She's not used to taping up someone's guts and throwing them a handful of ibuprofen before they try and rescue a team member when they should be in surgery. It can't be hygienic, navigating a Hive on the best of days, much less when you've been buried under rubble, breathing in brick dust and pulverized rodents; she took an oath to do no harm, but she let him go, run the risk of straining his vital organs beyond what they can stand, coasting the fine edge of blood loss and muscle weakness, flirting with shock. It's enough to set her fretting the entire time he's gone, chewing on her thumbnail until it's bitten to the quick, and when SGA-1 comes back, moderately whole (all things considered), she's so mad she actually considers kicking Sheppard in the balls.

But she doesn't – she wheels him into surgery, messes with his insides, flushes out the wound and puts him on an IV drip. But he's not done yet – nope, that'd be sidling too close to the idea of being a model patient, so he fights the anesthesia, struggles in recovery to come up from the drugs too fast. She's never seen anything like it, the way he can't relax, even when basic chemistry's telling him to knock it off, and she's foraging through every obscure medical reference she's memorized to find some way to calm him down when Ronon saunters in.

"You can't be in here," she tells him, exasperated. "He's still . . ."

"I'm just gonna sit," he says, ignoring her completely, and she'd yank his goddamn hair to make him pay her mind if not for the fact that he looks like shit and John's vitals aren't wigging out quite so badly as before. That distracts her enough that she doesn't realize Teyla's shown up too, baby in her arms, and sure enough, Rodney materializes four or five seconds later, big tired bruises under his eyes.

None of them are going to listen to her, not a one.

So she makes a decision, wheels in beds, brooks no refusal from anyone, not even Ronon, not even when he glares. Before her shift's ended they're gathered in a make-shift heap, Teyla on John's left side, Rodney on his right, and Ronon's bed's flush against the foot of all three, like he'll take on anyone who tries to get to his team.

"Sleep," she says, doling out painkillers, poking her finger in Rodney's face with such authority he shuts up meekly, curls up on his side. She sees him slip a hand underneath John's elbow, sees Teyla press her knee gently against John's thigh. She's not surprised that Ronon's latched a hand onto John's ankle, and if she thinks about it, there's a twisted, Pegasus nonsense to the way Sheppard's finally quiet now, his team all around him, gathered in safe. What's that compared to drugs?

"You are in so much trouble," she tells them, meaning it. "I swear. You're gonna hear about this 'til the cows come home."

But she can't seem to help herself – she's wearing a smile.


End file.
